Time of Honor

I am wondering why I have not written this post earlier. Maybe because admitting to love for a historic series is a faux-pais among sophisticated cosmopolitan circles of mine? Or because my own understanding is too intimate, at the edge of something very personal?

So now after 4 seasons and at the beginning of the 5th one I do admit my love to a series Time of Honor.

Some years ago during a project focused on renacting groups recreating historic events related to occupied Warsaw I heared from one lady- veteran about consulting a script for the series dedicated to parashooted underground soldiers - Cichociemni.

These guys were trained in Great Britain by their former Polish instructors to be parashooted on the occupied territories with aim to profesionally organize resistance against Nazis but also against the Soviets who basically occupied half of the country.

Time of Honor is a result of private passion of many people. it recreates realities of pre-war Warsaw, occupation, Soviet invasion but also later hopeless fight put against Soviet domination and fiction state Stalin imposed in Jalta.

The script follows a story of friendship between 4 guys, their family life, love life and parallel stories. There is also a triangle. A Judas - Karol whose sister was held by Gestapo is trying to sell off his wife's friends into German hands. The very same Judas compromised by long term cooperation with the Germans starts cooperating with the Soviets. His wife leaves him during the war and unites with her lifetime love - trained underground soldier parashooted from Britain. Cichociemni - underground soldiers who never had given up their weapons and never recognized Soviet Polish state become his enemies forever. He would spend his life clinched between rests of remorse and passion for revenge... There is also a doctor Otto-  a German with a golden heart who comes from Breslau and who faces death sentence for helping his love and friend dr Maria - wife of a Polish general. Each character has a unique and real personality, attitude, looks, style of walk, dress etc.

In the script there is nothing too long. No situation, no dialogue, nothing boring or too psychological. Pure action and thrill in war realities.

It is also not patriarchal story of brave male cocky dominance. They are male and female, but all of them are in combat despite their obvious sexual differences. All of these women seem far less intellectually castrated than many I meet in my contemporary life.

Last but not least. Music makes it! The author of the music album made already international career and received many awards both in Poland and abroad. Chajdecki is not a noname in music world. He is just 32 - my age, but since 16 cooperates with such institutions like Yale School of Drama or New York School of Visual Arts.

The music for the series was nominated for IFMCA in 2011.

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I cannot stop thinking that it somehow portrays private life and struggles of my grandma. It takes imagination to look at 86 year old woman and see Wanda or Ruda in her. Imagine she dressed and looked like the ladies in the series. That she behaved like them too... now she barely walks.